


sixth time's the charm

by writingdice



Category: Gravity Falls
Genre: Self-Harm, Suicide, Suicide Attempt, Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-06
Updated: 2018-12-06
Packaged: 2019-09-13 05:00:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 966
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16886076
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/writingdice/pseuds/writingdice
Summary: Five times Stanley thought about killing himself and the one time he….





	sixth time's the charm

i.

Sometimes, when he was a kid, Stan would sit by the peer with his twin brother and gaze at the sea, wondering what it would feel like to sink down beneath the waves and struggle for air as the world became dark and cold.

He would look at his brother and hold on tight to his hand. Feeling like he was already drowning on mainland. Ford would look at him with curiosity written all over his face and squeeze his hand reassuringly, without knowing what he was reassuring Stan for.

Stan would feel safer and his breath would come back. The sea still loomed and haunted his dreams but he had a six fingered hand to hold onto.

ii.

When he was a teenager some days the world itself seemed to be drowned, dark and cold. And everyday, he woke up and smiled, he cracked jokes and flirted with girls… it completely exhausted him.

He would have liked to stop it all… To do something reckless and end it all. But Ford needed him. Ford needed him and that was enough to keep those thoughts away.

Ford would let him hold him close. Ford would let him comfort him and make him feel accepted. Ford would let him kiss him. It felt good to be needed and it made him feel loved. It was enough to keep him from drowning in those thoughts. Ford’s hand still felt like safety for him, so he held on tight and did his best to laugh it off.

He would live for Ford.

iii.

Everything he ever thought to stop himself from doing it was now meaningless. He was 22 years old and standing on a bridge, looking down and wondering if it would hurt that much but not really caring about the pain.

He doesn’t jump. He sits down in the driver seat of his car and feels numb as he tries to focus on something else that isn’t what his mind pleads him to do. He cuts once, he cuts twice. But it’s not enough.

Stan goes to clandestine fights and he uses his box training to win some money. The pain from the wounds after the fight numbs all the other thoughts away, lets him focus on how to make more money, how to make his way back home.

He keeps living for Ford.

At night he yearns for a six fingered hand to hold onto and feels lips press against his. He cries himself to sleep.

iv.

He stands in a beach from a different place in a different time.

He gazes at the waves and still wonders what drowning feels like. But he has felt dead for a very long time. He feels like a corpse hanging onto what little life it has left.

He looks at the photograph on his hand and sees his own smile. He remembers that he always felt proud of his brother. Stan can’t remember a time when his brother had ever been proud of him… He can’t really blame Ford.

He’s a mess. Has always been a mess.

Stan lits another cigarrette and continues gazing at the sea. Dusk turns into night and he’s still standing there, clutching the photograph in one hand and a lighter on the other.

He wonders if burning is worse than drowning. The lighter tempts him and beckons him to near his hand to the flame.

Stan drops the lighter in the sand and drives away.

v.

His brother is gone and it’s all his fault. He spends days in agony and misery trying to get him back. He doesn’t mind the burn on his shoulder, he doesn’t care that he has to live a lie. It doesn’t matter, Stan has been dead since he was a kid.

He drowned. He died in a fire. He jumped off a bridge. He stood in the train tracks. He overdosed on his antidepressants. He cut his skin wide open. He drank bleach.

It doesn’t matter how he died, he is already dead, and he will die again.

He laughed it off.

He worked on the portal that took his brother away and put up an act for tourists. He created attractions and legends to keep his bussiness going, and he taught himself everything he needed to know to bring Ford back.

He laughed it all off.

Thirty years all paid off when he saw Ford come out of the portal. Thirty years…. no, forty years all paid off when he got to see his face again.

Forty years all came crashing down as his brother punched him in the face.

Forty years and he gets thrown out to the curb again.

vi.

Stanley Pines has always lived for someone else. Never for himself.

Stanley Pines lived for his brother, for Soos and Wendy, for Mabel and Dipper.

He would like to keep lying to everyone and laugh it off again. Just silly old Stan joking about his own death. But Stanley Pines is just really tired.

Stanley Pines stands in a clearing with a gun aimed to his head.

“Quick. Painless”, a voice keeps repeating, “Easy peasy, don’t you even worry!”

Just silly old Stan laughing off his death.

He thinks about not doing it today, maybe tomorrow, after calling the twins and make sure they are okay.

“You said that the last time and you know you won’t call. If you don’t call you can always use that as an excuse to not die the next day”, high pitched laughter echoes inside his mind as he lowers the gun.

“Don’t worry, though”, it says as his arm moves on it’s own accord. The last thing he hears is…

“I got your back”.

He doesn’t drown.

He doesn’t burn.

He goes out with a bang.


End file.
